Interactive telephone systems enable a user to interactively request information through a computerized interface. These systems typically utilize predefined or prerecorded menus that a user accesses by calling in to a central number. The predefined menus typically enable a user to request information by stepping through various predefined choices that remain the same regardless of who the caller is or of the content of the information being accessed. Such information may include accessing account information, movie times, service requests, etc.
A problem with these systems is that the menu structure is typically set and not customized to a particular's users preferences or customized to the information available to that user. Therefore, a user may have to wade through a host of inapplicable options to get to the one or two options applicable to that user. Further, a user may be interested in particular information. With existing telephone call-in systems, that user has to input the same series of options each time they want to hear that information. If the user desires to hear the information frequently, the telephone input system described is a very time consuming and wasteful method of accessing that information. Moreover, if a user is interested only in knowing if a particular value or set of values has changed over a predetermined period of time, in such a system, the user is required to initiate a call and wade through all of the information to determine if the particular value has changed.
These and other drawbacks exist with current systems.